


Giving Themselves Away

by Glinda



Category: Stardust
Genre: F/M, Families of Choice, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-02
Updated: 2010-04-02
Packaged: 2017-10-08 15:08:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/76908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Glinda/pseuds/Glinda
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Both Yvaine and Captain Shakespeare have grown used to hiding parts of who they are, and treasure kindred spirits all the more for it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Giving Themselves Away

**Author's Note:**

> Tiny fandom. So naturally I write a mostly gen, friendship piece. For the prompt 'Opportunity' for [](http://overlooked.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**overlooked**](http://overlooked.dreamwidth.org/)

Captain Shakespeare never thought, when he claimed Tristan as his nephew, that it would make much of a difference either way to his career. He'd expected a few days of pleasant company and hoped, as he watched Tristan and Yvaine slowly falling in love, that he might occasionally have the pleasure of their company when their paths crossed in years to come. He did not expect his whole world to be turned upside down, nor to have Tristan's actual uncle hold a sword to his throat and his reputation to ransom. However, Septimus had died, leaving Tristan as the last heir of the Stormhold line and Shakespeare to find that the new king owed him a debt of gratitude instead.

The people of Stormhold were used to bloodthirsty rulers and royal intrigue. Their new King had a good origin myth: son of a lost princess, hidden away in Wall to protect him from his murderous uncles only to return to claim his birthright and win the heart of a fallen star. That he'd come of age on a sky-pirate ship, under the tutelage of the fearsome Captain Shakespeare, only added some necessary steel to young Tristan's reputation. Shakespeare and his crew were finding that far from having damaged his reputation his dealings with the Royal House of Stormhold had only enhanced it.

~

The tower room is open to the skies and there are doubtless many who will think it chilly. To someone who has spent almost his entire life above cloud level however, it's positively balmy. This is Yvaine's domain so Shakespeare treads carefully; he doesn't doubt his welcome but he equally doesn't want to end up pushed off a tower by accident. He follows the familiar aura until he finds her sitting on the floor staring up at the sky and her – friends? Perhaps even family, he wonders in the privacy of his own head – compatriots above them.

"You requested my presence, my lady," he comments, giving her a full courtly bow.

She smiles up at him, her face lighting up, figuratively for a change, at the sight of him. He takes a moment to bask in her smile; it has been a long time since a young woman as beautiful as this one looked at him with such unguarded affection and pleasure. His proclivities may never have run her way, but he enjoys the attention regardless of its platonic source.

"I'm sorry to call you back here, so soon before the wedding but I'm afraid I have one last favour to ask of you," she says, breaking into his reverie.

"For you, my lady, anything," he assures her, "my crew and myself are ever at your service."

Oddly his statement contains more truth than hyperbole, not that the crew would admit it under pain of torture, but they are oddly proud of their role in guarding this star who will soon be a queen. That she and Tristan have shown their gratitude for their actions by making the main port of Stormhold a safe harbour to the Caspartine probably helps too. Yvaine extends her hand regally and he takes it, raising her gently to her feet. She still limps a little when she walks he notes, probably always will.

"I'm very grateful for everything you've taught me William," she smiles as she pauses to catch his eye, knowing full well that she is one of only two people in the whole of Stormhold who dare use that name to his face, "and your insatiable curiosity about the rituals of England have saved me much embarrassment in making sure certain appropriate rituals are adhered to properly."

Most of the wedding is to be a state affair, tied into the coronation ceremony to symbolise their vows of fidelity both to each other and to their kingdom; however, a small part of it will be held the night before. A simple family hand fasting free of the pomp and rhetoric of the state marriage. It is this ceremony that has both Yvaine and Tristan most nervous, both of them having recruited Shakespeare to tease out information about each other's traditions. It had been an informative experience certainly, had given Shakespeare plenty of opportunities to tease them both, and he was a little disappointed that he would not see first hand how it played out.

"I am a long way from home and my chances of ever returning to my own kind are, well a little slimmer than that knife you keep in your boot. For all that Tristan has done his best on the matter, insisting the wedding be at night and outside so that my kin may watch me from afar; they cannot be here in person. This favour is rather a personal one, I'm afraid - and I will entirely understand if you decline it, I promise not to hold it against you." She pauses for a moment as though embarrassed to have babbled at him, so he smiles reassuringly at her while internally racking his brains to think what her request would be. He would gladly bring her kin to her if it were in his power, the only way would be a handful of Babylon candles and these days those are rarer than, well, stardust. Yvaine takes a deep breath and continues. "I'm told that, traditionally, at weddings both here and in Wall, the bride's father accompanies her to the altar. Something to do with symbolically passing her from one family to another I believe. In the absence of her father, the bride is usually given away by someone else who has played that role in her life, a protector, someone who has guided and advised her. I wondered if you would mind, if I could ask you to…you know, be that for me?"

There is no pity in her eyes, only a little of his own well-hidden loneliness reflected back at him. There is an opportunity here, a family to be the irascible, unrepentant, but secretly fondly regarded, black sheep of, and if its just another role for him to play, it is at least one he can be sure he'll enjoy.

"It would be my honour," he assures her. She drops down onto a nearby rocky outcrop, relief radiating off her in waves, as though only her own will power had kept her standing before.

"I'm not sure I really understand the point of the ritual, honestly, the emotional significance certainly but not the practical purpose," she sounds almost herself again, as though a considerable weight has lifted from her. Seating himself beside her on the outcrop he nudges her shoulder gently before responding,

"I'd always presumed it was to keep the bride from running away, or to guard against someone else stealing her away." It was certainly what he intended to tell his crew his role in the procedures was to be.

Yvaine's laughter bubbles out of her unexpectedly, "So I should expect you to have your sword to hand in case of marauding pirates?"

"Naturally, a gentleman is never fully dressed without his sword," he responds struggling to maintain his straight face.

"You sir," she assures him laughing, "are no gentleman, and we wouldn't have you any other way."

He isn't, he assures her laughing, even slightly, and this easy acceptance of all the things he is and isn't might be what he loves best about her and Tristan. He is proud and glad to call this pair his friends and even more so to call her daughter, if only for one night.


End file.
